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Sen. Elizabeth Warren pushes to break up big tech companies like Amazon and Facebook

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FreddyE1977 said:
Apparently it's not only Right-Wing Extremists like yours truly
who believe that these companies have gotten too big and need to be
brought to heel.
Click to expand...

Any political scientist will tell you that the political spectrum isn't a continuum, but a circle. The further you go in either direction, the closer they become.

You can already see the battle that's going on between Amazon and the city of New York. Rep AOC is also against Amazon. In the past, Republicans used to take the side of big business. That party doesn't exist any more. The extreme far right has a lot of common ground with the far left and the socialists. They both hate big business and ultimately believe in governmental control.
 
TheBigA said:
Any political scientist will tell you that the political spectrum isn't a continuum, but a circle. The further you go in either direction, the closer they become.

You can already see the battle that's going on between Amazon and the city of New York. Rep AOC is also against Amazon. In the past, Republicans used to take the side of big business. That party doesn't exist any more. The extreme far right has a lot of common ground with the far left and the socialists. They both hate big business and ultimately believe in governmental control.
Click to expand...

Which is why Germany's National Socialist Party had "socialist" right in its name but was intractably opposed to the type of socialism posited by Marx and put into practice by Lenin as communism. Both parties were totalitarian. The only difference was the sorts of people they felt they had to kill off as poisonous to their ideal society.
 
CTListener said:
The only difference was the sorts of people they felt they had to kill off as poisonous to their ideal society.
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The bad news is if you empower the justice department to investigate rich and powerful companies, and the president happens to own such a company, it inevitably leads the justice department to bring down the president. It's the legal version of what happens if you empower the military. You end up with a military coup. The interesting thing here is the cabinet is mainly made up of rich billionaire businessmen. The Secretary of Defense might come under investigation by the DOJ. Then what happens?
 
How will that work though given that once a company like Google aka Alphabet Holdings, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, IAC and Twitter get seen as "too big" though.

I remember back in the dot com boom of 1999-2000 everybody thought at the time that Yahoo and AOL were too big as Tech companies though until they got hit by the recession and got hit by a series of security issues at the time until Facebook, Twitter, Google took their places though.

You need a recession to take down facebook, twitter, amazon and Google if we see them as having too much power.
 
RadioPatrol said:
You need a recession to take down facebook, twitter, amazon and Google if we see them as having too much power.
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The difference is the left is concerned about economic power, and the far right is concerned about power of speech.

The only reason the right is concerned about Amazon is the CEO happens to own a newspaper. No such concern about eBay.

If he sold his interest in the paper, it would save the company. Just as if AT&T sold CNN, they'd be fine.
 
Here's more on Warren's point of view:

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/202...rren-unveils-plan-break-big/story?id=61555895

What politicians don't consider is how their politics can unknowingly hurt innocent people, by inadvertently causing stock that's part of a retirement plan to drop. Just today, Amazon stock fell by $5. A lot of 401Ks and pension plans are heavily invested in something called FAANG. You can imagine what those letters stand for. If this country is moving away from traditional company-funded pensions, and if conservatives are looking to cut social security, they can't also attack profit making companies that their voters are now using as replacements for pensions and social security. That's an easy way to give votes to other candidates.
 
Given that AMZN stock trades for over $1600 a share, that $5 move today amounts to noise.

I think there is a decent chance something like Senator Warren's plans will come to pass, eventually.
 
PTBoardOp94 said:
I think there is a decent chance something like Senator Warren's plans will come to pass, eventually.
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I just watched her interview on MSNBC and her plan sounds an awful lot like net neutrality, which Republicans repealed.

The question people have to ask is who do they trust: Big business or big government. Because it's either one or the other. The third option is anarchy.
 
TheBigA said:
The question people have to ask is who do they trust: Big business or big government. Because it's either one or the other. The third option is anarchy.
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No, the third option is what the Libertarians propose. Limited government, but with limits on private enterprise as well. The pure philosophy is fiscal conservatism and liberal social policy.
 
DavidEduardo said:
No, the third option is what the Libertarians propose. Limited government, but with limits on private enterprise as well. The pure philosophy is fiscal conservatism and liberal social policy.
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Not a lot of libertarians promoting that concept. That's the political equivalent to a niche radio format.

You can't have limited government and corporate regulation. The regulations will require regulators, and that means more government. It also leaves a vacuum in terms of who is responsible for protecting the internet from hackers and foreign attackers. Right now, big tech companies are taking that role. But the far right claims that's causing corporate censorship. Remove those companies from that role, and who's left to protect us from the hackers? Someone has to be the adult in the room. That's why I say the third option is anarchy.
 
I had to laugh when I saw a random commenter state that the government should seize and redistribute 99.5% of Bezos' net worth and redistribute it to the workers. Stocks, everything. Though wouldn't you have to have someone actually buy that stock?
 
gr8oldies said:
I had to laugh when I saw a random commenter state that the government should seize and redistribute 99.5% of Bezos' net worth and redistribute it to the workers. Stocks, everything. Though wouldn't you have to have someone actually buy that stock?
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Karl Marx would be proud.
 
gr8oldies said:
I had to laugh when I saw a random commenter state that the government should seize and redistribute 99.5% of Bezos' net worth and redistribute it to the workers.
Click to expand...

What those commentators don't know is that Bezos has actually done a lot of that without government forcing him to. Workers at Amazon have profit sharing and stock plans. Most tech companies have that. Apple, Google, and Facebook employees are all invested in the success of their companies. And as I said, anyone who invests in mutual funds of any sort will likely have Amazon in their portfolio.
 
gr8oldies said:
I had to laugh when I saw a random commenter state that the government should seize and redistribute 99.5% of Bezos' net worth and redistribute it to the workers. Stocks, everything. Though wouldn't you have to have someone actually buy that stock?
Click to expand...

Was that a mainstream news / commentary source?

Certainly shows a lack of understanding of how market forces work. If you give Amazon shares to the workers, most are going to sell them... creating an excess of supply and a lack of demand, driving the price waaaaaay down. In the end, the workers end up being at a less highly valued company run by a less focused board of directors, which is considered a milestone event for a company going into decline.

Venezuela did that with the oil companies. Now they can't even produce enough gasoline for local consumption.
 
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No, just idiots on Twitter but one had a blue check mark.

I think the idea was the government with liquidate Bezos' shares and distribute cash to the employees. I don't think it quite works that way.

DavidEduardo said:


Was that a mainstream news / commentary source?

Certainly shows a lack of understanding of how market forces work. If you give Amazon shares to the workers, most are going to sell them... creating an excess of supply and a lack of demand, driving the price waaaaaay down. In the end, the workers end up being at a less highly valued company run by a less focused board of directors, which is considered a milestone event for a company going into decline.

Venezuela did that with the oil companies. Now they can't even produce enough gasoline for local consumption.
Click to expand...
 
TheBigA said:
What those commentators don't know is that Bezos has actually done a lot of that without government forcing him to. Workers at Amazon have profit sharing and stock plans. Most tech companies have that. Apple, Google, and Facebook employees are all invested in the success of their companies. And as I said, anyone who invests in mutual funds of any sort will likely have Amazon in their portfolio.
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While it IS a little embarrassing for him to own the Washington Post with it's left-of-center orientation and to
NOT be doing those things.
 
FreddyE1977 said:
While it IS a little embarrassing for him to own the Washington Post with it's left-of-center orientation and to
NOT be doing those things.
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He was doing those things long before he owned the Post. One has nothing to do with the other. And you'll find that most tech companies do the same. It's a function of their business, not their politics.

It's also embarrassing for conservatives to want the government to force redistribution of wealth. Or demand more federal regulations on anyone or any business. Democrats and liberals are the ones who want to tax the rich and break up big business.
 
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